Timely discussion

I saw Scott Williams (pictured) , author of “Church Diversity,” yesterday at a summer track meet here in Oklahoma City.

When we talked briefly about my recent story on his new book, Williams asked me if I had known ahead of time that the Southern Baptist Convention was going to talk as much as it did about diversity in leadership at the denomination’s annual meeting last week (June 14-15).

The story on Williams and his book on church diversity ran the Saturday before the SBC’s annual meeting in Phoenix. I knew that ethnic diversity was to be a topic, but I had no way of knowing there would be as much talk about it at the meeting which was shown via live streaming video.

Williams, in his book, makes the argument that churches need to intentionally ensure that their leadership staff is ethnically diverse to help the congregation become more ethnically diverse. Well the SBC delegates voted to approve a recommendation from their Executive Committee that called for the denomination’s leader to be encouraged to appoint ethnically diverse leaders to fill various leadership roles.